site-responsive performance with respirator gas mask, protective goggles, ballet shoes, costume angel wing,costume latex gloves, plastic Gatling gun toy, rhinoceros plastic figurine, oil-soaked paper and white chalk accompanied by a looping live-recorded throat voice, approx.. 45 minutes.
performed for International Multimedia Art Festival 2023 at the abandoned Šumice Motel in Odžaci, Serbia, 2023.
video documentation by Andreji.
photo documentation by Nenad Bogdanovic, Massimo Sannelli and Silvia Marcantoni.
translated into Unction (study of Q), pencil drawing, inkjet print cutouts and found materials from performance site on oil-soaked paper 21x29.7cm, series of 10, 2024.
translated into /command8.text, chalk on oil-soaked paper and pencil drawing cutout on oil-soaked paper, diptych, 21x29.7cm each, series of 10, 2024.
Within the ruins of the abandoned Šumice Motel, a male performer dressed in white, looking angelic. He had one foot with a pearl-colored ballet shoes, which he kept on tiptoe throughout the performance. However as soon as the performance begins, he put on a gruesome-looking costume gloves on his left hand as if he were infected, diseased, perhaps at the brink of death. The room he had selected to present the piece were embellished with graffities that screamed HALLELUJAH, accompanied by a wall of hand prints, which he patiently interacted with. He put his transformed little finger close to the handprints, making promises he could not (and would not) keep. As the repetitive action took place, audience could find a stack of glistened black paper as they had previously been soaked in oil with a toy rhinoceros by its side, drinking from the minimalist pool of oil. Nearby a toy Gatling gun lied idly on a mountain of debris.
His monstrous hand then moved towards his mouth, forcing itself in, contorting his face. He choked repeatedly by the domination and as a result, he produced coarse throat sounds which he recorded with his phone and played in in loop. He left the device on the debris pile, took the toy gun with him and proceeded to walk towards the exit. Shortly before he equipped himself with a pair of protective goggles and gas mask, further blurring the visual representation of his body. It turned futuristic, almost mechanic, yet scientific and transhuman. Midway he found himself a mini angel wing which he wore by his legs. The wings protruding out of his knee almost like a pair of horns.
He started walking, one foot bare and another tiptoeing against a floor of debris, with various sharp objects as remnants of the architecture. As he moved further away from the room, his throat voice, his plea of survivor, his record of pain echoed and slowly faded as the audience joined his pilgrimage. His walk was strenuous, to the point it looked like his was injured. Yet with the gun on his humanoid hand and the zombified dangled on, he painted a potential image of a grim reaper. Travelling across the what used to be the hallway of the hotel, he passed through the lobby, leaving a trail of exhaustion, fatigue and time behind him.
He eventually reached a secluded and narrow corner with a black wall. Stripping his costumes off, returning to what was considered human, he started writing a series of text, over and over again.
Thank you very much and have a good night.
All the very best but goodbye for now and rest.
The visual utterance of goodwill was repeated, almost he were punished to do so. The messages were clearly visible at first but became blurry and hazy, ended in a chunk of white chalky mess. He ended the performance once fatigue set in but in the midst of a new graffiti (perhaps also an offering to the site), a small section remains clearly visible that gently and maybe regrettably declares, This is supposed to be a rock.
Teach Us How To Walk Tomorrow is Powapowa-P’s description of one of his last song before he committed suicide in 2015. The 2013 number is titled Q which in itself is a melody of death, grieving the death of his best friend. The performance is a visual iteration of Q that in itself challenges the artist’s personal dwelling with grief and death. The masculine body that is expected to remain strong and virile but how does it transform when sickness and demise follow suit. Developed as also a response to aging and what might be a case of time running out, the performance also aims to portray an image of body deteriorating. Exhaustion and fatigue are often utilized as a performative material by the artist that accompanied by natural audio reaction produced by the flesh, as well as the inevitable collapse of the physique mimic the abandoned quality of the site. However, despite the lethargy, death and its end are always optimistic. There are promises to make and to fulfill, and hopefully this performance gives a sense of that. A pinky interaction at the beginning and the well wishes at the end sandwich the intensity of the piece. Like Q, the performance is an remembrance and an offering of the forgotten and ultimately of time- and through an evolving image of a (masculine) body, it pleas a consideration of what is and has been left behind.